John Reginald Richardson

John Reginald Richardson, a prominent Canadian-American physicist, was born in 1912 and became a leading figure in the development of cyclotrons. His groundbreaking work included participation in the first demonstration of phase stability and the creation of the first synchrocyclotron and sector-focused cyclotron.

Raised in Vancouver, Richardson's family emigrated to the United States in 1922. He pursued his studies in physics at UCLA and later became a doctoral student under the guidance of Ernest Orlando Lawrence at the University of California, Berkeley, where he earned his PhD in 1937.

After a brief tenure at the University of Michigan, he joined the University of Illinois as an assistant professor. In 1942, Richardson contributed to the Manhattan Project, focusing on electromagnetic isotope separation at Berkeley and Oak Ridge, specifically working with the calutron.

In 1946, following the discoveries of phase stability and the synchrotron principle by Weksler and Edwin McMillan, Richardson collaborated with a team of physicists to convert the fixed-frequency thirty-seven-inch cyclotron at Berkeley into the first synchrocyclotron. This achievement not only demonstrated the phase-stability principle but also validated the conversion of the large Berkeley one hundred eighty-four-inch cyclotron into a synchrocyclotron.

Richardson's legacy continued with the construction of an even larger sector cyclotron capable of energies up to five hundred twenty MeV at TRIUMF in Vancouver, where he served as director from nineteen seventy-one to nineteen seventy-six, overseeing the cyclotron's construction. In 1991, he was honored with the Robert R. Wilson Prize for his contributions to the field.